Employment by sector is collected and tracked by the U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) each month through the Current Employment Statistics (CES) program.  It is a survey of approximately 145,000 businesses and government agencies, representing approximately 557,000 individual worksites, that provides detailed industry data on employment, hours, and earnings of workers on nonfarm payrolls.  To access sector employment data for the Region, please see the Data Clearinghouse page.  Or, to access additional data sets, visit the following websites:

Iowa current/historical monthly and annual data (Statewide and Metro Areas)
http://www.iowaworkforce.org/lmi/empstat/msanonag.htm

Illinois historical monthly and annual data (Statewide and Metro Areas)
http://www.ides.illinois.gov/page.aspx?item=915

National historical monthly and annual data (U.S.)
http://www.bls.gov/data/#employment. Go to the section:  Employment, Hours, and Earnings – National.  (Current Employment Statistics - CES)

National historical monthly and annual data (State and Metro Areas)
http://www.bls.gov/data/#employment.   Go to the section:  Employment, Hours, and Earnings – State and Metro Area.  (Current Employment Statistics - CES)

Or contact our Data Services Staff.

NOTE:  The production of State and metropolitan area Current Employment Statistics (CES) estimates transitioned from State Workforce Agencies to the BLS with the production of preliminary estimates for March 2011. Concurrent with this transition, the BLS implemented several methodological changes to standardize the estimation approach across States. More detailed information on the changes to procedures for producing CES estimates is available on the BLS website at http://www.bls.gov/sae/cesprocs.htm. 

For more information on the differences between the Current Employment Survey (CES) Program and the Local Area Unemployment Statistics (LAUS) Program, see pdf  ces_laus_comparison.pdf (37.21 kB) .